MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) PT Lowered to $425.00 at Bank of America

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) had its price objective decreased by Bank of America from $530.00 to $425.00 in a research note released on Wednesday, Benzinga reports. Bank of America currently has an underperform rating on the technology company’s stock.

Other equities analysts have also recently issued research reports about the company. Morgan Stanley reduced their target price on MSCI from $671.00 to $615.00 and set an overweight rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday. Raymond James restated a market perform rating on shares of MSCI in a report on Friday, January 5th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their target price on MSCI from $544.00 to $617.00 and gave the stock a neutral rating in a report on Wednesday, January 31st. StockNews.com cut MSCI from a buy rating to a hold rating in a report on Tuesday, February 20th. Finally, Redburn Atlantic cut MSCI from a neutral rating to a sell rating and reduced their target price for the stock from $620.00 to $470.00 in a report on Tuesday, February 20th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of Hold and an average price target of $562.87.

MSCI Stock Up 2.9 %

MSCI stock opened at $477.78 on Wednesday. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $541.71 and its 200 day simple moving average is $537.78. The stock has a market cap of $37.85 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.61, a P/E/G ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 1.06. MSCI has a 12-month low of $439.95 and a 12-month high of $617.39.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 23rd. The technology company reported $3.52 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.44 by $0.08. The business had revenue of $680.00 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $685.47 million. MSCI had a negative return on equity of 121.86% and a net margin of 44.55%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 14.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $3.14 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that MSCI will post 14.59 EPS for the current year.

MSCI Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 31st. Investors of record on Friday, May 17th will be given a $1.60 dividend. This represents a $6.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.34%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, May 16th. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio is presently 43.69%.

Insider Activity at MSCI

In other news, CEO Henry A. Fernandez bought 13,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, April 25th. The shares were acquired at an average price of $465.92 per share, with a total value of $6,056,960.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 327,479 shares in the company, valued at $152,579,015.68. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other news, CEO Henry A. Fernandez bought 13,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, April 25th. The shares were acquired at an average price of $465.92 per share, with a total value of $6,056,960.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 327,479 shares in the company, valued at $152,579,015.68. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, COO Cd Baer Pettit bought 7,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, April 25th. The stock was purchased at an average cost of $459.41 per share, for a total transaction of $3,445,575.00. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 291,038 shares in the company, valued at approximately $133,705,767.58. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. 3.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of MSCI. Ronald Blue Trust Inc. grew its stake in MSCI by 105.1% in the third quarter. Ronald Blue Trust Inc. now owns 80 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $41,000 after purchasing an additional 41 shares in the last quarter. Flagship Harbor Advisors LLC grew its stake in MSCI by 6.7% in the third quarter. Flagship Harbor Advisors LLC now owns 561 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $288,000 after purchasing an additional 35 shares in the last quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC grew its stake in MSCI by 348.7% in the third quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC now owns 341 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $175,000 after purchasing an additional 265 shares in the last quarter. Caprock Group LLC grew its stake in MSCI by 4.5% in the third quarter. Caprock Group LLC now owns 669 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $343,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Czech National Bank boosted its stake in shares of MSCI by 45.9% during the 3rd quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 13,823 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $7,092,000 after acquiring an additional 4,346 shares during the period. 89.97% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

MSCI Company Profile

MSCI Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides critical decision support tools and solutions for the investment community to manage investment processes worldwide. The Index segment provides indexes for use in various areas of the investment process, including indexed financial product, such as ETFs, mutual funds, annuities, futures, options, structured products, and over-the-counter derivatives; performance benchmarking; portfolio construction and rebalancing; and asset allocation, as well as licenses GICS and GICS Direct.